Why does the math in pathfinder "break down" at higher levels?


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Ashiel wrote:
Holy Crap Demon Horde

I haven't had the pleasure of playing a high level game for long, that looks terribly daunting to me.

Then I remembered how much aoe damage a Blockbuster Wizard puts out and smiled.

Ashiel, count me as a guy who wants to sit down at your table. That fight looks terribly fun.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Even though the pit fiend is listed as solitary, pair, or council, his stats are really more like a boss beatstick. He should travel with help. If I were statting a pit fiend for a solo encounter, I would make different feat selections and magical treasure would definitely be used.


Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.

Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Scavion wrote:
Ashiel wrote:
Holy Crap Demon Horde

I haven't had the pleasure of playing a high level game for long, that looks terribly daunting to me.

Then I remembered how much aoe damage a Blockbuster Wizard puts out and smiled.

Ashiel, count me as a guy who wants to sit down at your table. That fight looks terribly fun.

My favorite thing to do as a GM?

..."And this many bone devils."

(sprinkles handful of appropriately sized items onto mat near boss)


Marthkus wrote:

55 AC? That's ridiculous. No amount of spin will fix that.

Waves of Exhaustion fails do to SR. Oh and good luck being able to sunder a +5 item or doing anything at all to it short of dispelling.

Oh no the Buckler has 50 HP and Hardness 20, that's so hard to break its surely impossible.

SR is clearly spell immunity. If you cared at all about SR, and you should since you've gotten to 17th level, You've atleast got a 50/50.


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Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.

You can buy a +2 sword easy. A +1 evil outsider bane weapon with greater magic weapon cast on it is all you need.

Heck, you'd almost think that the martial character soloing the encounter wasn't intended. I mean, at that level, you're dealing goo-gobs of HP damage per hit (1d8+7+2d6+10+8 = 36.5 one-handed damage, which is more than 1/10th the pit fiend's total HP). You're also auto-confirming critical hits when they come up.

God forbid the party's bard casts greater invisibility on you and lets you demolish the pit fiend.

Or that anyone bothers to debuff the pit fiend.

Or you know, people actually do something.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Pit fiend and balors only have hit points in the mid 300s. A 17th level fighter hitting even twice per round is going to cut through it like holiday ham.


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Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!


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RJGrady wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.
Pit fiend and balors only have hit points in the mid 300s. A 17th level fighter hitting even twice per round is going to cut through it like holiday ham.

Yep. A Fighter who hits twice in a round shaves off a 3rd of it's hit points.


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Scavion wrote:
Ashiel wrote:
Holy Crap Demon Horde

I haven't had the pleasure of playing a high level game for long, that looks terribly daunting to me.

Then I remembered how much aoe damage a Blockbuster Wizard puts out and smiled.

Ashiel, count me as a guy who wants to sit down at your table. That fight looks terribly fun.

Thanks. I agree that the fight looks like a lot of fun. It's definitely do-able at 17th level. By that time your party is probably throwing around spells like holy word (this spell alone can devastate large swaths of the baddies) and banishment. The martials can tear the marilith a new one while casters CC / sweep enemies. When I design encounters, especially high level ones, I think about how I'd like the encounter to flow and how it can be beaten.

For another favorite high-level encounter idea I liked was my interpretation of the goddess Hecate.

CR 25 Hecate Abilities:
On a side note, Hecate was my favorite patron goddess in Age of Mythologies: Titans. What amuses me the most about the rebuttal is that it seemed to strike a nerve. What amuses me more is the fact that, again, forcing the deity to flee or waste actions swatting gnats. Since the deity in the statblock had no special sensory abilities listed, simply flying through the ground until in roughly the correct area would pretty much allow them to swarm her. Being incorporeal means that you can get attacked in 3 dimensions from every possible angle. Only six need to strike her to kill her, statistically. It's kind of funny, actually.

Really, her statistics are inflated and for seemingly no reason. She's not scary, she's not interesting, and she's not very special, except she has big numbers. Big numbers mean very little in the grand scheme of things. I'd much rather see a CR 25 deity that was competent and could shirk such paltry attempts at deicide as laughable (in much the same way that a carpet bombing of shadows is not a serious threat to a good party of high level PCs). The shadow scheme wouldn't function vs a Solar (a creature that would assuredly be worshiped as a god in reality), yet it would force that "Hecate" into fleeing the scene at least to keep from dying to a buncha CR 3 enemies. It's "lolzy". :P

If you're going to give deities deity-specific powers, at least make them interesting. Not much is more boring than "Harhar, I haz more numbers than j00". I'd much rather see a "Hecate" that was more along the lines of a CR 25 creature, except perhaps with more interesting abilities such as:

Trivia Form (Su): As a move action Hecate can create two copies of herself: Hecate of the Past and Hecate of the Future. These copies are identical to Hecate except that they lack this ability and have two negative levels (these negative levels cannot be removed in any way). While the copies exist Hecate gains two negative levels which cannot be removed until the copies are destroyed or she dismisses them (as a free action). Hecate and her copies all share the same mind. Mind-affecting effects that affect one affects the others, though this state grants a +6 bonus on Will saving throws against mind-affecting effects. At any time (even when it is not her turn) Hecate can choose one of her copies to become the real Hecate (instead of a copy) and her original body to be treated as a copy instead (allowing her to dismiss it as desired). Though this ability is a supernatural one, the copies are not (nor is the option to allow a copy to become the real Hecate) and thus they continue to exist where supernatural abilities do not function (such as in an antimagic field).

Hounds of Hecate (Su): Once per round as a free action, Hecate can summon a pack of hounds to her aid as if by a summon monster spell except that the range is long (400 ft. +40 ft. / level) and she may summon as many as she likes as long as their combined experience value is CR 16 or less (for example, Hecate could summon eight CR 9 Nessian Hell Hounds or one CR 16 26 HD huge nessian hell hound). The type of hounds that Hecate can summon with this ability are Hell Hounds, dogs, riding dogs, wolves, dire wolves, worgs, and winter wolves (and advanced versions of any of these). She typically favors calling two CR 14 22 HD nessian hell hounds each round.

Paired Torches (Su): Hecate has two torches that hover around her. One a white flame casting a powerful light radius and another a black flame that fills an area with darkness. The light torch functions as if under the effects of a 9th level continual flame spell while the darkness torch functions as if under the effects of a 9th level deeper darkness spell. Once each round as a free action Hecate can decide which of the two torches is dominant (light or dark). In either case Hecate can see in the radius of these torches as if under the effects of true seeing. Hecate may dismiss or recall these torches as a free action (even if the torches have been destroyed).

Robe of Spells (Su): Hecate is empowered by her magic in ways that others cannot fully comprehend. Hecate gains a circumstance bonus to all attacks, saves, and checks equal to the highest level spell she can cast (typically a +9 bonus, included in her statblock). If Hecate would fail a saving throw she may expend a spell or unused spell slot to re-roll the saving throw with a bonus equal to the level of the expended spell or spell slot.

Limitless Magic (Ex): Hecate can any 1st through 6th level spell she has prepared at-will as a spell-like ability, and any 7th-9th level spell she has prepared 3/day as a spell-like ability. Hecate may apply the benefits of feats that modify spell-like abilities (such as Quicken Spell-like Ability) to new spell-like abilities each day.

^ The above special powers on a CR 23-25 creature would be WAAAAAAY more interesting (both from a stylistic perspective and for a battle) than bigger numbers. Assuming she had theurgic casting between druid and wizard spells (which would be appropriate for Hecate) then she would be wickedly versatile, flood the field with minions each round on the round (possibly requiring people to continue to dismiss or wipe her trash mobs each round to avoid getting overcrowded), and she has some powerful defensive abilities, and can split herself into three of her (literally tripling her action economy at the cost of 2 negative levels).

Also, agreed on SR. A 17th level caster succeeds on at least a 13+ vs the pit fiend's SR. Not even counting things like +caster level effects like ioun stones or prayer beads or feats or racial abilities. Outside of core, you even have piercing spell which gives +5 vs SR with a +0 level adjustment.

Waves of exhaustion exhausts with no save. Hit the pit fiend with that and he gets a -6 to Strength and Dexterity, cannot run or charge. That's also a -3 to AC for those at home in the audience! :P


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Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!

Look into the face of madness!

It could have been a mean encounter. I mean, the party could be facing a 21st level wizard with NPC gear. You wanna talk about a fight...


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I have to retract my earlier suggestion to use a wand of disintegrate. Disintegrate is too high level of a spell to be a wand, and I'm not aware of a staff with that function. The DC to emulate a high enough Intelligence is somewhere around 31, so that's kind of iffy for a scroll. I guess I'll have to stick with using haste and enlarge person and repeatedly sundering the buckler!


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Staff of Many Rays or Staff of Transmutation can be used for Disintegrate


Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!

damage per swing for a vanilla fighter is 2d6(7)+5enh+4+15str = 31

.85*31 = 26.35 DPR on a full-attack before crits...

You'll be able to raise that a bit with trap feat chains and special magic items, but for the most part you are tickling the monster.


Ashiel wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!

Look into the face of madness!

It could have been a mean encounter. I mean, the party could be facing a 21st level wizard with NPC gear. You wanna talk about a fight...

I'm beginning to understand why martials are looked at so poorly for high level play.

With encounters like that, they barely do anything on a full-attack.

Might as well only have spell casters.


If 55 AC is something that even level 20 characters are suppose to handle, then I'm in the camp that the math does break down at high levels.

Just tell the martial classes to go home. It's up to the casters to handle real threats.


Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!

damage per swing for a vanilla fighter is 2d6(7)+5enh+4+15str = 31

.85*31 = 26.35 DPR on a full-attack before crits...

You be able to raise that a bit with trap feat chains and special magic items, but for the most part you are tickling the monster.

Oh, oh! I can play that game too!

Funny how your DPR calculation only considers the 1st attack... It even ignores the extra attack from Haste. How cute...

Now, assuming your average damage is correct... And that for some reason, the Fighter doesn't have Improved Critical...

My DPR calculator tells me the average DPR is... 50.22

Add Improved Critical and it goes up to 58.6

Add... I don't know... Flanking. And the DPR raises to 73.78

That Fighter will kill an enemy with CR+3 in 4~5 rounds. That's okay to me. It's a CR+3 encounter! And it's not even a particularly optimized Fighter!

Marthkus wrote:

I'm beginning to understand why martials are looked at so poorly for high level play.

With encounters like that, they barely do anything on a full-attack.

Might as well only have spell casters.

Because low damage output is what people complain about martial classes, right?


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Marthkus, you haven't accounted for so much as haste or flanking. To call your analysis superficial would be an insult to mall retail stores.

Paizo Employee Design Manager

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Marthkus wrote:

damage per swing for a vanilla fighter is 2d6(7)+5enh+4+15str = 31

.85*31 = 26.35 DPR on a full-attack before crits...

You'll be able to raise that a bit with trap feat chains and special magic items, but for the most part you are tickling the monster.

A +5 weapon will completely overcome the Pit Fiend's Damage Reduction, regardless of material or specific enchantments. You are short-changing the Fighter substantially, and not just with your assumption that only one of his attacks will ever hit in a given round. Your "vanilla" fighter is also apparently an unbuffed idiot with no friends, which doesn't match up with any Pathfinder game I've ever played. I would expect any fighter of that level to have a number of magic items boosting his accuracy and damage, as well as potions, buffing effects from allies, etc.


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Oh, and let's not forget the possibility of getting the Pit Fiend flat-footed... In which case that Fighter's DPR raises to...

141.05

Before flanking. And before the rest of the party decides to help the lonely Fighter facing a g++%&*n CR+3 encounter.


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Lemmy wrote:

Oh, and let's not forget the possibility of getting the Pit Fiend flat-footed... In which case that Fighter's DPR raises to...

141.05

Before flanking. And before the rest of the party decides to help the lonely Fighter facing a g~%&*+n CR+3 encounter.

Just wanted to point out, that greater invisibility kind of ruins stuff for a pit fiend that's not chugging potions. Even with an erinyes spotter (true seeing), he's still denied his +9 Dex to AC and such if he can't see the fighter. This is one of the reasons a bard can dismantle a pit fiend pretty hard unless the pit fiend can manage to keep up see invisibility via items constantly.

Marthkus wrote:

If 55 AC is something that even level 20 characters are suppose to handle, then I'm in the camp that the math does break down at high levels.

Just tell the martial classes to go home. It's up to the casters to handle real threats.

I think you're missing some of the value of a high level martial. See, it's actually really, really hard to outsmart a sword. In high level combat, you generally want to send the martial at the big guy. Notice for a moment that while the pit fiend speccing AC is going to be able to survive a few hits from a fighter, the fighter is going to laugh at the pit fiend's attacks.

In essence, the pit fiend does not want anything to do with that fighter. The best thing the pit fiend can hope is that the fighter will biff a save vs mass hold person (which the fighter is likely immune to), or trap the soul (which requires the pit fiend to be close to the fighter and for the fighter to biff his save, assuming the fighter isn't benefiting from spell immunity vs the spell).

Meanwhile, the casters can debuff, CC, pin down, and wipe adds. The martials on the other hand are something that the demon's resistances can't stop, and the martials are someone the demon can't bully around in melee (because, again, a pit fiend having a slugfest vs a wizard is a good deal for the fiend, but a terrible one if you replace the wizard with a core martial class).


Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:
Marthkus wrote:
So the fighter does crap for the fight...(since the AC we are talking about is 55) And that's assuming an optimized build with perfect item drops.
Considering it's CR+3, hitting 50% of the time is pretty good.... The bane weapon might be pushing it, but it's easily replaced by flanking.
Not all the time, just the first attack. Then you have a 25% chance, then 5% and you finish off with 5%.

Wait... So the Fighter can't solo a creature with a CR 3 points over his level?

I'm shocked!

Ashiel is obviously insane!

damage per swing for a vanilla fighter is 2d6(7)+5enh+4+15str = 31

.85*31 = 26.35 DPR on a full-attack before crits...

You be able to raise that a bit with trap feat chains and special magic items, but for the most part you are tickling the monster.

Oh, oh! I can play that game too!

Funny how your DPR calculation only considers the 1st attack... It even ignores the extra attack from Haste. How cute...

Now, assuming your average damage is correct... And that for some reason, the Fighter doesn't have Improved Critical...

My DPR calculator tells me the average DPR is... 50.22

Add Improved Critical and it goes up to 58.6

Add... I don't know... Flanking. And the DPR raises to 73.78

That Fighter will kill an enemy with CR+3 in 4~5 rounds. That's okay to me. It's a CR+3 encounter! And it's not even a particularly optimized Fighter!

Marthkus wrote:

I'm beginning to understand why martials are looked at so poorly for high level play.

With encounters like that, they barely do anything on a full-attack.

Might as well only have spell casters.

Because low damage output is what people complain about martial classes, right?

That's the whole fullattack haste nets you another 15 damage....


Marthkus wrote:
That's the whole fullattack haste nets you another 15 damage....

Am I the only one that noticed the part where the fighter is dealing a significant amount of the BBEG's HP %, as one-fourth a party? Anyone?


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Let's see...

Warrior:
Warrior
Human Warrior 20
N Medium humanoid (human)
Init +7; Senses Perception +8
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 33, touch 20, flat-footed 27 (+9 armor, +5 Dex, +4 natural, +4 deflection, +1 dodge)
hp 210 (20d10+100)
Fort +26, Ref +21, Will +22
Immune fear
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 60 ft.
Melee +5 bane (evil outsiders) falchion +42/+42/+37/+32/+27 (2d4+20/15-20/×2+2d6 vs. Evil Outsiders)
Ranged +3 adaptive composite longbow +34/+34/+29/+24/+19 (1d8+13/×3)
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 31, Dex 20, Con 20, Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 8
Base Atk +20; CMB +37; CMD 50
Feats Furious Focus, Improved Critical (falchion), Iron Will, Power Attack, Weapon Focus (falchion)
Traits indomitable faith, reactionary
Skills Acrobatics +8 (+20 jump), Appraise +4, Bluff +3, Climb +13, Diplomacy +3, Disguise +3, Escape Artist +8, Fly +8, Heal +8, Intimidate +3, Perception +8, Ride +8, Sense Motive +8, Stealth +8, Survival +8, Swim +13
Languages Common
SQ bane
Other Gear Celestial armor, +3 Adaptive Composite longbow (Str +4), +5 Bane (Evil Outsiders) Falchion, Amulet of natural armor +4, Belt of physical perfection +6, Cloak of resistance +5, Feather step slippers, Headband of inspired wisdom +6, Ioun stone (pale green prism (cracked, Attack), Manual of gainful exercise +2 (spent), Ring of protection +4, 435825 GP
--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
Bane (Evil Outsiders) +2 & +2d6 damage vs chosen type
Feather step slippers Ignore difficult terrain as though affected by feather step.
Furious Focus If you are wielding a weapon in two hands, ignore the penalty for your first attack of each turn.
Immunity to Fear (Ex) You are immune to all fear effects.
Power Attack -6/+12 You can subtract from your attack roll to add to your damage.

Now, now... This guy's DPR against the Pit Fiend with AC 55 is:

69.12.
89.6 if flanking.
176.44 if the Pit Fiend is flat-footed.
192.0 if the Pit Fiend is somehow is flanked and flat-footed.

Not very good, I'll admit... But then again... He is a freaking 20th level Warrior who only spent about half of his WBL and half his feats.

Even so... He still manages to hit the creature 50% of the time with his 2 main attacks.

So forgive me if I'm not worried about Fighters, Barbarians, Paladins and Rangers... Or any PC class that decides to swing a sword, really...


Ashiel wrote:

I think you're missing some of the value of a high level martial. See, it's actually really, really hard to outsmart a sword. In high level combat, you generally want to send the martial at the big guy. Notice for a moment that while the pit fiend speccing AC is going to be able to survive a few hits from a fighter, the fighter is going to laugh at the pit fiend's attacks.

In essence, the pit fiend does not want anything to do with that fighter. The best thing the pit fiend can hope is that the fighter will biff a save vs mass hold person (which the fighter is likely immune to), or trap the soul (which requires the pit fiend to be close to the fighter and for the fighter to biff his save, assuming the fighter isn't benefiting from spell immunity vs the spell).

Meanwhile, the casters can debuff, CC, pin down, and wipe adds. The martials on the other hand are something that the demon's resistances can't stop, and the martials are someone the demon can't bully around in melee (because, again, a pit fiend having a slugfest vs a wizard is a good deal for the fiend, but a terrible one if you replace the wizard with a core martial class).

An AC of 55 does a great job at shutting down non casters. Why out-smart the sword when it can barely hit you?

Let's total up that to-hit with a vanilla fighter against this vanilla monster

20BAB + 5enhancement + 10str + 4weapon training + 2 heroism + 1 haste + 2 flanking = 44

vs 55

Needs 11+ to hit for 7+5+15+4=31 damage

We have 50%, 50%, 25%, 5%, 5% to hit for each attack. DPR calculation before crits is 1.35*31 = 41.85 on a full attack. I could double that and it would be noticeable, but still awful. And that's supposedly a lvl 20 fighter vs a CR 20 encounter. Well I hope the rest of the party can pick up the slack, because it's not like full-melee-attacks weren't rare enough, but the fighter needs them to less than what a single power attack would do otherwise against a sane lvl of AC.


Marthkus wrote:
That's the whole fullattack haste nets you another 15 damage....

I'm pretty sure your math is off.


Lemmy wrote:

69.12.

89.6 if flanking.
176.44 if the Pit Fiend is flat-footed.
192.0 if the Pit Fiend is somehow is flanked and flat-footed.

Not very good, I'll admit... But then again... He is a freaking 20th level Warrior who only spent about half of his WBL and half his feats.

So forgive me if I'm not worried about Fighters, Barbarians, Paladins and Rangers... Or any PC class that decides to swing a sword, really...

Not-very-good is more than 1/2 the pit fiend's Hp. Flat-footed and flanking is actually really easy at this level. Greater invisibility + summon monster I-IX/summon nature's ally I-IX = flanking + flat footed.

Again, the pit fiend is a CR 20 encounter. It's a terror to fight. If "I full attack" is all it takes to kill this, someone is doing something very wrong.


Lemmy wrote:

Let's see...

** spoiler omitted **...

Do people actually get bane falchions for every BBEG they fight?

I've never even seen a falchion drop. Let alone a magic one tailored to counter the enemy I was fighting.


Ashiel wrote:
Not-very-good is more than 1/2 the pit fiend's Hp. Flat-footed and flanking is actually really easy at this level. Greater invisibility + summon monster I-IX/summon nature's ally I-IX = flanking + flat footed.

I kinda ignore Invisibility since any creature worth a damn will have an answer to it, like a permanent True Sight effect or something...

Invisibility is one of those things that either you can counter or you're done, so any enemy with CR 10+ is likely to be more than able to deal with it. (Well... Maybe CR 13+)


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Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:

Let's see...

** spoiler omitted **...

Do people actually get bane falchions for every BBEG they fight?

I've never even seen a falchion drop. Let alone a magic one tailored to counter the enemy I was fighting.

I'm, sorry... Are you saying my 20th level Warrior with half WBL and half the appropriate number of feats is too optimized???


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Takes 8 days to make a +1 bane weapon vs the type of your targeted foe. Slap a greater magic weapon on it and you're good to go.

A proactive party doesn't wait for the world to give them the tools they need, they make them.

Edit: Probably only takes 4 days, due to Accelerated Crafting. 2, if it's being made by a crafting focused wizard (with either a Valet archetype familiar or familiar feats, depending on your GMs interpretation of familiars with feats).


Marthkus wrote:
Ashiel wrote:

I think you're missing some of the value of a high level martial. See, it's actually really, really hard to outsmart a sword. In high level combat, you generally want to send the martial at the big guy. Notice for a moment that while the pit fiend speccing AC is going to be able to survive a few hits from a fighter, the fighter is going to laugh at the pit fiend's attacks.

In essence, the pit fiend does not want anything to do with that fighter. The best thing the pit fiend can hope is that the fighter will biff a save vs mass hold person (which the fighter is likely immune to), or trap the soul (which requires the pit fiend to be close to the fighter and for the fighter to biff his save, assuming the fighter isn't benefiting from spell immunity vs the spell).

Meanwhile, the casters can debuff, CC, pin down, and wipe adds. The martials on the other hand are something that the demon's resistances can't stop, and the martials are someone the demon can't bully around in melee (because, again, a pit fiend having a slugfest vs a wizard is a good deal for the fiend, but a terrible one if you replace the wizard with a core martial class).

An AC of 55 does a great job at shutting down non casters. Why out-smart the sword when it can barely hit you?

Let's total up that to-hit with a vanilla fighter against this vanilla monster

20BAB + 5enhancement + 10str + 4weapon training + 2 heroism + 1 haste + 2 flanking = 44

vs 55

Needs 11+ to hit for 7+5+15+4=31 damage

We have 50%, 50%, 25%, 5%, 5% to hit for each attack. DPR calculation before crits is 1.35*31 = 41.85 on a full attack. I could double that and it would be noticeable, but still awful. And that's supposedly a lvl 20 fighter vs a CR 20 encounter. Well I hope the rest of the party can pick up the slack, because it's not like full-melee-attacks weren't rare enough, but the fighter needs them to less than what a single power attack would do otherwise against a sane lvl of AC.

You left out Greater Weapon Focus, which is another +2. Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level, unless you're relying on potions or something. That's another +2 to hit. So using your math, we're looking at a hit on a 6+.


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Ashiel wrote:
You left out Greater Weapon Focus, which is another +2. Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level, unless you're relying on potions or something. That's another +2 to hit. So using your math, we're looking at a hit on a 6+.

Ash... Marthkus is complaining that my character with levels in a NPC class, half feats and half WBL is too unrealistically optimized. I don't think he cares about weapon Focus....


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Lemmy wrote:
Ashiel wrote:
Not-very-good is more than 1/2 the pit fiend's Hp. Flat-footed and flanking is actually really easy at this level. Greater invisibility + summon monster I-IX/summon nature's ally I-IX = flanking + flat footed.

I kinda ignore Invisibility since any creature worth a damn will have an answer to it, like a permanent True Sight effect or something...

Invisibility is one of those things that either you can counter or you're done, so any enemy with CR 10+ is likely to be more than able to deal with it. (Well... Maybe CR 13+)

Fair point.

Marthkus wrote:

Do people actually get bane falchions for every BBEG they fight?

I've never even seen a falchion drop. Let alone a magic one tailored to counter the enemy I was fighting.

Aratrok is right. This is a very lame argument in this case. You can buy +2 weapons easily in core. CORE. Like, where 16,000 gp is the limit on "can buy easily", the cost of an evil outsider bane sword is 8,000 gp.

Then you can either greater magic weapon like Aratrok said. Or if you have anyone in the party who can craft/upgrade items, you just upgrade the darn thing. The time required to make items isn't so bad when you're upgrading an existing item.

For example, the time it takes to make a +6 magic sword from scratch is 72 days / 36 if rushing it. But if you're upgrading it?

2 days / 1 days = +1 sword
6 days / 3 days = +2 sword
10 days / 5 days = +3 sword
14 days / 7 days = +4 sword
18 days / 9 days = +5 sword
22 days / 11 days = +6 sword


Lemmy wrote:
Ashiel wrote:
You left out Greater Weapon Focus, which is another +2. Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level, unless you're relying on potions or something. That's another +2 to hit. So using your math, we're looking at a hit on a 6+.
Ash... Marthkus is complaining that my character with levels in a NPC class, half feats and half WBL is too unrealistically optimized. I don't think he cares about weapon Focus....

You're right. Needs more cowbell.


Ashiel wrote:
You left out Greater Weapon Focus, which is another +2. Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level, unless you're relying on potions or something. That's another +2 to hit. So using your math, we're looking at a hit on a 6+.

I didn't leave out greater weapon focus. I didn't add it intentionally.

I will give you greater heroism though

so we are looking at 60%, 60%, 35%, 10%, 5%

1.7*31 = 52.7 before crits. Well now are making progress. I can double that and clear a hundred.

IMHO 55 AC is still retarded. I believe in preventing rocket tag by playing the monsters intelligently not by adding +17 to their AC. Pit fiends are SLA heavy creatures. You can just move it around so that fighters don't get to full-attack and they would still be doing better damage than fighters full-attackong AC 55. AND you have the adding benefit or non-full martials being able to do things with weapons.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Marthkus wrote:
Lemmy wrote:

Let's see...

** spoiler omitted **...

Do people actually get bane falchions for every BBEG they fight?

Maybe not specifically. My players did eventually acquire a dragon bane composite longbow and a stack of holy arrows; a couple of light adamantine maces; a cold iron morningstar and a whole traveling case full of oils; and a ghost touch undead bane morningstar. Truth be told, dragon bane and evil outsider bane weapons can be good long-term investments.

Dark Archive

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Or hey, here's an idea: make a two-handed fighter and auto-crit with a scythe that has had its modifier raised to x5 by the fighter capstone. Not level 20 yet? Worry not! Auto-critting with a x4 weapon is almost as bad. Pit fiend, what pit fiend? Assuming the pit fiend does survive it'll sure not be staying to continue the fight. No sane intelligent creature is going to keep fighting after someone dropped it to double digits with one swing. This'll work with a weapon that has no enchantment on it at all and a fighter that didn't even so much as bother to take improved critical. When it comes to a it like that... well, DR don't do you too big of a favor.


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Ashiel wrote:

Now I personally would decorate the pit fiend in a much more rounded assortment of gear, because like with PCs, I think one-trick ponies are not very smart.

I'd gear said pit fiend in...

+5 bracers of armor (25,000 gp)
+5 buckler (25,000 gp)
+3 amulet of natural armor (18,000 gp)
+5 cloak of resistance (25,000 gp)
+4 circlet of charisma (16,000 gp)
25,000 gp worth of miscellaneous things (bag of holding or haversack containing wands, scrolls, soul gems, art objects, jewelry, etc).

That would bring them to AC 55, buff saves a bit, add +2 to the DC of their spells, and probably allot some nice trinkets to spice up the encounter with.

Why are you paying 25k for a 5 point armour bonus when you can get the same thing for 16k with a +4 Haramaki. Or just pay 750gp and buy a wand of mage armour which you can activate as soon as a minion alerts you there is trouble.

The cloak of resistance isn't doing much for you either as Unholy Aura is already giving you +4 resistance.


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Quote:
Also, agreed on SR. A 17th level caster succeeds on at least a 13+ vs the pit fiend's SR. Not even counting things like +caster level effects like ioun stones or prayer beads or feats or racial abilities. Outside of core, you even have piercing spell which gives +5 vs SR with a +0 level adjustment.

At level 17 any moderately well built caster is tearing through SR31 on a 5. CL17 +4 from greater spell penetration +4 otherworldly kimono +1 orange ioun stone. They are ignoring it completely for their spell perfection spell or if they use Piercing Spell. The main issue is actually beating its saves. A +25 reflex with unholy aura means it has a decent chance to avoid being dazed by your preferred evocation control. 22 will is easier to hit so some form of persistent control spell could well take it out. I would expect most capable casters at this level to be regularly dropping spells with DC's in the low 30's or mid 30's for spell perfection.


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Lemmy wrote:
Invisibility is one of those things that either you can counter or you're done, so any enemy with CR 10+ is likely to be more than able to deal with it. (Well... Maybe CR 13+)

This only remains true until the casters hit 15/16 and start casting Mind Blank. You really want some way to grab blinsight/blindsense. Then you want to make sure you always stay indoors in small rooms.

There is little more terrifying than fighting a flying greater invisible mind banked spellcaster engaging you at medium long range. At 16th level that is 260-840ft, well outside most blindsight/sense ranges (and true seeing if it applied which it doesn't).

That applies as equally to NPC casters as PC ones.


Ashiel wrote:
Just wanted to point out, that greater invisibility kind of ruins stuff for a pit fiend that's not chugging potions.

I was curious about which potion you were using. See Invisibility is a personal spell so cannot be made into a potion. Is there another spell that will do the same thing?

Personally I would probably give the Pit Fiend a decent level Cleric minion or a scroll/wand. Invisibility Purge will get rid of Invisibility and doesn't care about Mind Blank.


Ashiel wrote:
Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level

Greater Heroism is vey strong but its much lower duration means it is liable to drop off if the pit fiend engages in hit and run tactics using its at will greater teleport. Frankly if a group of powerful adventurers manages to corner me in my liar then standing toe to toe with them is likely to be suicidal. Far better to retreat, prepare and then send wave after wave of minions at them to wear them down before hitting them back on your own terms.


Umm, wow, just... wow. I haven't played/run a lot of high level games so my experience is limited. Last time I did we were woefully NOT optimized, made it to 16th level and had some items of legend to help fill in the gaps. The only thing my Halfling fighter had going for him that was "broken" was a 26 Strength. That being said, in a PF updated Hut of Baba Yaga module I was able to claw my way UPSTREAM against the current of an anti-gravity centrifuge type thing and jam up the hut's engine doohickey. That was epic fun.

Still, even though I don't have the math in front of me, put me in the "math breaks down" camp. We smashed into a room, surprised a powerful demon (I think it was a pit fiend) and I DESTROYED IT IN ONE HIT! I wasn't optimized and was wielding a 2 handed hammer. Suffice it to say, I figured at that point it would be a win-or-death module.

I think between this thread and several others like the DPR Olympics we can see where even legal combos lead to ridiculously powerful PCs. Even if the GM were ignoring monsters and just simply crafting equally optimized NPCs for the villains, once the party reaches a certain level open combat or physical conflict is sort of a foregone conclusion.

Granted there are tactics that can be employed on both sides to modify this. Hit-and-run opponents, scrying and surprise, and other unique one-off conditions may extend combats or modify the outcome. However in a direct match up it becomes rocket tag.


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Marthkus wrote:
Ashiel wrote:
You left out Greater Weapon Focus, which is another +2. Also, greater heroism is the buff of choice at this level, unless you're relying on potions or something. That's another +2 to hit. So using your math, we're looking at a hit on a 6+.

I didn't leave out greater weapon focus. I didn't add it intentionally.

I will give you greater heroism though

so we are looking at 60%, 60%, 35%, 10%, 5%

1.7*31 = 52.7 before crits. Well now are making progress. I can double that and clear a hundred.

IMHO 55 AC is still retarded. I believe in preventing rocket tag by playing the monsters intelligently not by adding +17 to their AC. Pit fiends are SLA heavy creatures. You can just move it around so that fighters don't get to full-attack and they would still be doing better damage than fighters full-attackong AC 55. AND you have the adding benefit or non-full martials being able to do things with weapons.

I think you've missed the point, and this entire tangent has gone way off topic as a result.

The point of that item set up for a pit fiend was not to say that every pit fiend should have a 55 AC. It was to demonstrate that by using monster treasure at high level you can radically skew the stats of any monster to respond to your party's strengths and weaknesses without having to rebuild anything and while still working entirely within the context of the Bestiary.

You have a bunch of fighters that carve through standard AC's like butter? Invest some protective items. You have casters with stupid high save DCs? I guess you should grab some immunity stuff and save boosters. These are changes the bestiary assumes you are making to monsters to fit your campaign - and this is especially true at high levels. The treasure of a monster is built into its CR, and if you aren't using that then you aren't playing it to its CR. I have very little sympathy for the people that argue the math breaks down and their PCs steam roll everything when they play monsters naked and stupid. This isn't to say you have to spend every gold piece on an item in such a way as to buff stats - if your party is not particularly optimized you could use the version of the pit fiend for example that Kain posted with just a couple items.

Monster treasure use also shows why I think the idea of the 'benchmark' numbers and the whole concept of 'DPR' tend to only work in a vacuum - with even a marginal about of prep and no changes to the base stats you can turn 'auto fail on every save' or 'AC the fighter hits on a 2' into something else - if that is required. It also demonstrates that depending on the game you can have large swings in these base numbers even using bestiary monsters.

TL:DR - Don't focus on AC 55, look at spending treasure as the salient point here.


Lemmy wrote:

Let's see...

** spoiler omitted **...

Now, now... This guy's DPR against the Pit Fiend with AC 55 is:

69.12.
89.6 if flanking.
176.44 if the Pit Fiend is flat-footed.
192.0 if the Pit Fiend is somehow is flanked and flat-footed.

Not very good, I'll admit... But then again... He is a freaking 20th level Warrior who only spent about half of his WBL and half his feats.

Even so... He still manages to hit the creature 50% of the time with his 2 main attacks.

So forgive me if I'm not worried about Fighters, Barbarians, Paladins and Rangers... Or any PC class that decides to swing a sword, really...

Can you do the math for a full 20 level fighter?

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

Always a pleasure to see that I'm really not that far up the optimization scale. :) Some of the stuff here in this thread is way above my pay grade.


But wait, why to focus in a fighter, lets have a party of 4 18 level character agaisnt 4 cr 20 improved encounters. Not all monster at the same time of course, but one afther the other (so we can not assume all the buff are on all the time)

what about Ranger,cleric, wizard and a bard?


Marthkus wrote:

If 55 AC is something that even level 20 characters are suppose to handle, then I'm in the camp that the math does break down at high levels.

Just tell the martial classes to go home. It's up to the casters to handle real threats.

There are things that when played with no concern to RAI and a lenient DM are game breaking sure. If your DM allows a 10th level wizard to casually generate 3 MILLION gps* of wishes due to a very strained reading of a certain spell- then yes, the math gets wonky.

BUT There's a difference between 20th level and "high level". Even Paizo has few AP's that go beyond 17th level, things do get a little weird up there. Not just in Pathfinder, but also in all D&D games. Heck, even in other games- in high level T&T games the math COMPLETELY breaks down. Even in Runequest- once you get to 100% block...well.... Get a Champions PC to 350 points or even before- and the math goes out the window. I never played Chivalry & Sorcery to "high levels" but that's OK, since the math broke down at 1st level. ;-)

So, I don't know why everyone is singling out Pathfinder.

I have not played any PF at what I'd call "high level' that is 17+. But so far in our 13th level mythic game, it does. And to some 13th level is "high". I have played 3.5 to Epic and yes, things get weird once 9th level spells are available. Once a spellcaster can cast Shapechange, the need to a martial is pretty much gone.

So- in Roleplaying games in general - do things start to break down with very powerful characters? Yes. In PF, the problem isn't anywhere near as much as in other games. But at the very highest levels, it's there and it takes a experienced DM to handle it.

* Oh heck- why stop at 3 million? Start selling or even giving away wishes to everyone. By Ashriels math, every single person in Golarion would have +5 to all stats- 'cause why not? Wait- why stop at persons? Family pets, farm animals......

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